Esuous right, he yea sat America and Jeery Holland.
For regious one nation.
God, yes, it is wrong.
This is Columbia's Morning News with Gary David and Christopher Thompson on one O three point five FM and five sixty AM w VOC.
Good morning. It is sixteen after six, it's Tuesday, it's the twenty fifth of February, and it's terrific. Have you waking up with us? Gary David here, Christopher Thompson.
There, you're assuming we woke it up.
Well, it's all relative, isn't it. Yeah? I woke up early this morning, did you. Yeah? Well, I had got in bed littlely normal last night. I'm prime, I'm pumped, I'm ready for action, and I stay you apparently aren't. I stayed up late? You know?
I started watching that uh zero Day series Zero Day on Netflix, the Robert de Niro as the former president.
When okay, well there's your first mistake.
It is a little odd, Robert, the cyber attack that you've been fascinated by for years.
Oh I was I didn't know what was up on Netflix. Huh yeah, Zero Day? Yeah, movie or series? Did you just.
Say it's a five? I think it's five episodes.
Okay, so I like those. Now, if I'm streaming and I see something as season ten and I've never seen it before, I'm like, not even going there, even start going to do it? Not happening.
Yeah, so zero, it'll make you think. Yeah, and again, I'm only two episodes in. But it's a lot of scenarios that you've described on this program over the years, a lot of possibilities.
Well, even though de Niro is in it, I guess I'm gonna have to watch it now.
Yeah, it's a little difficult to take in that position, but.
Yeah, you're talking. That be a nightmare, right there, wasn't it, President Robert de Niro? Now anyway, Okay, well, good morning to you. But down on my list of things to do right there. Let's get right at it, my friends, the big stories, the hot topics. Now Here at home, things fairly quiet, although I were grabbing my attentions this morning was an article on the state newspaper. This is something we've talked about from time to time, and all of us around here are just like, how has this
never happened? The headline is this finally taking advantage city envisions, park apartments, dining on Columbia Riverfront. Well, it's a pound dog on time, isn't it. Have you ever been to a city it has rivers running through it and we got three of them? You know that hasn't developed that property? Well, we never have here. I guess there are a number of reasons why. I used to say back in the day, Well it's because CCI was over there. Wow. Yeah, that
was a little bothersome. You know, you had Remember all the festivals we used to have down the river front in the spring, we had all we had Spring Fest and Mayfest and all the fests and all of the you know you walk like right past c c I to get to it. Well that turned a lot of
folks off. But apparently the city earlier this month started to start the process of looking for developers and designers, looking for folks who already have experience building world class waterfront parks to come up with a design for one here in Columbia.
I thought we already had that design laid out. But I guess it's because they're they're building that road that is going to connect the north to the south end. I guess that's why they have new access. So they're looking for a new plan.
For decades.
It feels reminiscent of something we've already done and we're still building out Fenday Park.
Well, yeah, yes we are, which is a whole other issue right there.
What eleven million dollars or so.
A few coins. Yes, again, this has been a vision since the nineties and it's now twenty twenty five and maybe maybe this time it happens. But again, it won't happen tomorrow. It'll be a long process. But you know it's high time. I mean, why have we never taken advantage of that? Republicans over the State House posted Curry Assays dropping a six figure sum on advertisement's this to try to beat back a public influence campaign. It's a
paper called it a shadowy public influence campaign. This has to do with one of the top priorities in the session, and that is lawsuit reforms, you know, the whole the reason why you've got you know, small establishments, some of them even restaurants, but certainly bars that are shutting down because they can't afford the insurance. So what is this shadowy public influence campaign?
Well, you don't have to go very far on social media to see it.
No, you don't.
Although it's you know, it's a lot of unidentified folks out there, but who might be behind it. They have very strong opinions and very deep pockets.
Top judge in our state, that would be the Supreme Court Chief Justice John Kiddridge is saying that we hear the court system needs more money to expand family courts, calling these court systems and crisis, and more money is needed to bring them up to day, to modernize them and to get them doing what they need to do. Yeah,
that scary moment Thomas just mentioned. Everybody was talking about yesterday that flight from Atlanta to Columbia, Delta flight that had to turn back around because of Hayes and the cockpit. I don't think we know yet exactly what caused that, but yeah, anytime a plane fills up with smoke, that's never a good thing. News nineteen talked to some folks who were on it, and yeah, they're pretty shaken up. They kind of described the scene inside that that aircraft
when it filled with smoke, people crying, people screaming. Yeah. Electricity and the people paying I mean out there those last night customers of Tri County Electric Cooperative meeting with the company leadership and demanding answers. There are reports that some residents with Tri County Electric have seen utility bills as high as get this, one thousand dollars in a single month. Wow, one thousand dollars. Well, they'd like some
answers to that. I get we've had a cold winner, all our bills are up, but I mean, come on one thousand dollars? Really? Hm? Or up on Capitol Hill, the back and forth over Elon Musk and the you know, tell us what you did five things you did last week or or resign. Well, a second email going out from Musk telling federal employees will get a second chance to respond or else face termination. Now, well, Trump spoke about this yesterday, defending the decision, the decision by some
of his cabinet members to ignore the Elon Musk weekend edict. Okay, well, we talked about this yesterday. I mean, is there's going to be a parting of ways between those two between Trump and Musk. A lot of confusion over this is the administration going back on it. Well again, Musk just sent out a second email last night, and apparently those will use artificial intelligence to assess the responses they do get the ones, they get to see whether or not
these jobs are really necessary or not. Well for starters, you see who does respond. Well, yeah, I mean there are people who are just aren't even checking their emails period, and that that'll weed out some right there. Yeah, that's part of the problem right there, right over in Congress of Mike Johnson trying to find some consensus, trying to get this reconciliation bill done. But it's things well, let's
put it this way. The Trump budget bill, the big beautiful bill, seems to be in trouble to send it past their own version. The House likely not to go along with it, so that back and forth continues. Emanuel Macron in town, well not here, but in DC, praising Trump for taking steps to end the Russian war against Ukraine, but to telling Tron to be careful in the negotiation process. Have you heard Apparently part of what's going on here Trump is talking about mineral rights in Ukraine as part
of all this deal. Macron also saying that yeah, Trump is right when it comes to spending boosting on defense and more European nations need to do so. Yes, we got some ratings information to pass along. How about this one Harvest Capps Harris study finding that Trump is at fifty two percent approval rating. About that, uh and well, the judges, the activist judges. Another Obama appointed judge yesterday ruling that ICE agents are not permitted to uh, well
go into certain places of worship. Okay, So there we go with that all over again. You've got now one member of Congress who is pushing back on this judicial pushback and leading an impeachment charge against some of these activist judges. And after what about a decade or so, I guess at the helm Lester Holt stepping down is the anchor for NBC Nightly News. You see that did He'll continue his anchoring of Dateline because that's an easy gig.
You know, you go in there and you're probably in a matter of an hour your shoot scenes, you know, for who knows how many maybe a whole season is worth the shows and you're done. That's an easy gig. He'll keep doing that, but we'll be stepping down as the anchor. So a lot of a lot of the whole NBC, MSNBC, a lot change going on, Joy read out other shows being canned, and now, well the broadcast
business a bit of an uproar. We'll get to that more on this the Tuesday edition at Columbia's Morning News. Always great to have you with us.
You never know when the news will break, but leave us on and you will. I think we want to see more details right now. One O three point five FM and five sixty AM dou w VOC. This is Columbia's Morning News with Gary David and Christopher Thompson on one O three point five FM and five sixty AM w VOCs.
Six forty coming here up on six forty one. More thing too. It's Tuesday, February twenty five. Yeah. I don't have in front of you right now, but I you know, in my extensive preparation work this morning, since I got up early, got to hear lordly as usual, came across and we'll get into some of the other polls later on. But some poll said that Trump's approval ready on the economy is at thirty eight percent. This is one of the things that I warned about a lot of other
people did too. Again, you're not going to turn this economy around quickly. It's going to take a while. But I do fault Trump for during the campaign, campaigns or campaigns. But Trump's typically, you know, a fairly straight shooter with us, right, he didn't share code too much. But you know when he made a comment during the campaign he would bring down inflation on day one. Well, unfortunately there are people out there who hear that and believe it. I've got
a bridge I'd like to sell you. It's probably got some politicians name on it. More than likely. I mean, any rational person knows that's not going to happen. Then you've got, of course, the folks that well know better but want to take advantage of political purposes, the Democrat Party, the mainstream media. Yeah, man, Trump economy stinks. Been an office a month and a few days. Come on, and one of the more ridiculous notions is that this sky
high prices on eggs. I think answers she paid five ninety five for a dozen yesterday, that this is all Trump's fault. Well, of course that's ludicrous. Again, rational logical people understand this. You know, you got that Avian bird flu thing going on, and that didn't start when Trump took took over office. And well, regardless, now we have stories that eggs smuggling is on the rise. That's a that's a how do you how you getting these eggs in?
You ain't stuffing them down in your pants unless are hard boiled. More people are attempting to smuggle eggs into the States, and that poses health risks the here we go. I guess it's better to be smuggling and eggs and fentanyl. But customs and Border Patrol say they're seeing a surgeon illegal aliens attempting to bring raw eggs across the border. From October of last year through this month, CBP recording a twenty nine percent increase in egg detentions at ent
reports compared to the same time a year ago. I didn't know we had an issue with egg and smuggling to begin with. It's up twenty nine percent. Is that a regular thing? I don't try to smuggle eggs across the border.
I don't know if it's a regular thing, but I can understand why it's going on now.
Since January and the Olpaso regionalon officers have stopped over ninety individuals trying to bring raw eggs into the country from Mexico. Wow, okay, well, for the record, raw egg imports from Mexico are strictly prohibit it always have been, which I guess maybe I need to rethink my breakfast menu next time I travel to Mexico. Huh.
I you know, I have eaten at one of the restaurants that have put a search charge on their menu, and it will make your will make your check jump, There's no doubt about it.
Mm hm okay.
And I know a lot of people are then. I think that people initially think, okay, it's great, Well, I'll just go out and buy my own chickens and we'll just do with the thing in the backyard, not realizing a you may not be zoned for that, right. But more important, it takes what's it's at least six months. I think if you get a you know, baby chicken before it's ready to start laying eggs. So this isn't an instantaneous process. Oh, I'll buy chicken and here we go. Yeah,
well we have had a big breakfast tomorrow morning. Man, I bought some chickens today.
Yeah. And then there's of course the end, the maintenance and all that, and the c up and such.
Oh, it's a process.
I did not know this. The only country that the United States imports eggs from is Turkey? Were you aware of that? Mister Thompson didn't know that. I don't think any of us knew that. This is according to the American Farm Bureau Federation, Turkey the only country we import eggs from, and apparently returning to the Turks for Turkey eggs. Huh. Turkey said to export four hundred and twenty million eggs
to the States this year, the most ever exported. But don't expect that to make much of a dent in our egg shortage, they say. Now, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says the price of a dozen large Grade A eggs has recently hit an average of just under five dollars apparently, and was not a budget chopper, as you paid fie ninety five apparently nine. Prices are expected to
rise another twenty percent this year. Okay, although the USDA anticipates there's the light at the end of the tunnel, that egg prices will drop by Q two, which were on the cusp of here, well not quite maybe by mid year back down to about two fifty a dozen, but that evolves on a number of things. Okay, so there's the whole egg thing there. Now, this is interesting popular weight loss drugs like ozimpic with Govi and Manjaro. I'm not familiar with that one could shift the economy, huh.
Experts at Goldman Sachs predicting that if sixty million people take these meds by twenty twenty eight, there are country's gross domestic product will increase by trillions of dollars. That's gonna demand some explaining right there.
So it's going to shrink our waistlines and make us more productive as a human being.
More healthy and more productive.
Yes, okay, okay, I mean I still think I'd probably wait a little while before I took something like this.
Yeah, the verdict stilled out on that if you ask me.
But there are a lot of people. God, you look at some of these celebrities now, and you think I saw Monica Lewinsky doing an interview the other day.
I missed that. I think I didn't mention that she saw that too.
I mean she looked like a shell of her former self. I mean just I mean it almost looked like her face didn't fit right under her heir. She had so much hair and so little face. But I mean she's lost a ton of weight, and you see a lot of celebrities out there now who are just all in on this.
Well, hats off to Rob Low because he's just advertising the Adkin stuff. Yeah, so good for him. I don't know it, you know. I My fear is is that, you know, in another maybe couple of years, who knows what kind of like with the COVID the COVID vaccines, you know, we're gonna find out all And amazing how quickly that became mainstream. I mean, these were drugs for diabetics.
And then somebody discovered, oh my gosh, I lose weight, and they say there are other benefits too that they're talking about the fact that alcoholics could possibly see their their urges, their cravings diminished.
Well that ain't a bad thing, no, But it wasn't that long ago that we were you know, we had a shortage of these things, and people who needed these sorts of drugs for diabetes or diabetes couldn't get a hold of them. And now all of a sudden, it's like, you know, it zipic for everybody. They're figuring it out. But will it actually raise our GDP? I guess that's possibility.
Hey, docre, describe me some Mozimpic. I want to help raise the GDP. I mean, if it makes us healthier. I mean there are so many people who are unhealthy just because of their weight. Yeah, and everything that brings into play, sure, from blood pressure to everything else. If it makes them healthier, then you know it's not a bad thing.
Well, we'll wait to see what r. F. K Junior says about it. How about that.
You're listening to Columbia's Morning News on one oh three point five FM and five sixty am w VOC. Once again, here's Gary David and Christopher Thompson.
You work for the taxpayer. And if you're not working for the taxpayer, if you're not showing up to work, if you think you can work remote and not tell us what you do all week, that's not gonna fly any longer.
Good morning. It is fifteen after seven Ohio Congress Benjim Jordan yesterday on the Doze efforts and well the Elon Musk verdict, I say, Elon muskburg Elon Musk delivered the verdict. The edig Rather this this this you know, stems of course from sixteen to sixteen nine, Pennsylvan you have in the Oval Office in the form of Donald J. Trump.
You know, we've almost kind of forgotten here that a lot of this started with the fact that so many federal workers have been working from home for a long long time since the pandemic, were never ordered back into the office. What sort of oversight was there on what was and what was not getting done? You know, And there's there's so many other there's so many things going on.
I mean the again, the budget reconciliation bill. Uh, it's passage. Yeah, I know, the the House Speaker says one thing, but a lot of people think it's in trouble, you know. The or the upcoming peace talks with Ukraine and Russia, the continuing saga in the Middle East with the Moss not releasing all the hostages yet, so many things, the economy, but doze just sucking all the air out of the room. Man. And if it wasn't already, boy, it certainly is now.
With again the the email from Musk, which you know, the deadline was midnight last night, you know, tell us five things you got accomplished in the last week or resign. Last night was the deadline. And then as we talked about yesterday, there was pushback from most some cabinet agency heads don't, don't don't comply with this, And then another email goes out last night, Trump's saying that federal employees we'll got a second chance to respond or else faced
termination subject to the discretion of the president. He wrote on x they will be given another chance.
And how could you miss out? I mean, even if you're not checking your emails, which right, again, there's probably a select group within the federal government of people who just don't go online anymore. They're just they've given up on their jobs. They realize they're getting away with it and have been for years. But even even if that's the case, there's still hearing about this in the public.
Well, there's no way you didn't hear about this, of course, you know. I guess a lot of folks are banking on well, you know, and again when you've got well cash, Betel and Tulci, Gabbard and other agency ed saying don't respond to this. Well, I mean, so do you what do you do if you're a fellow employee in this, in this situation you listen to your agency a less Well, regardless.
I'd hope I'd be comfortable enough to say here's what I did last week.
Sure, Now this second email from Musque, though again failure to respond a second time will result in termination, contradicts the guidance that came out yesterday afternoon from the Office of Personnel Management oh PM told agency leaders yesterday afternoon that employee response to that initial email was not mandatory and that failure to do so would not be instead
of resignation. So again we get we have this tug of war going on here, and several departments and agencies quickly responded and followed up and told their employees not to respond to the email. Now, uh, the President defended yesterday the decision by again some of his cabinet members to ignore this this this weekend edict from from Musk.
Well, that's cutting the legs right out from under Elon Musk.
Yeah. But but but then he well, maybe for the complicated situation, suggesting that employees could still be fired or semi fired for non compliance.
So it's I don't even know what that means.
What is semi fired?
I don't know.
So yeah, we went from the midnight deadline last night based on the weekend email to the pushback from from No. Numerous cabinet heads to the Office of Personnel Management saying don't respond to that, to Trump defending his cabinet heads, and then saying, well they you still could be fired or semi fired if you don't comply. So yeah, I mean,
I listen. There's a tendency, unfortunately, in a story like this, to believe that, you know, all federal workers are out there just you know, kick back on the lazy boy, watching Oprah and collecting a paycheck every couple of weeks. Well that's not true. Now, are there some man, if you've been working from home all these years, and there is the problem. There's been no oversight, there's been no accountability for a long time, and so suddenly that changes,
and everybody freaks out here. This is a pretty drastic, pretty drastic change. But seriously, if your boss ask you, and you're in the private sector, ask you for you know, tell me five things you did last week. Doesn't mean that you actually accomplish something. You you but you know five things you worked on. You should be able to do that right now. So there's a lot of confusion
over all this and and now NBC reporting. The response is for those who do respond to that email that those responses will be fed into an artificial intelligence system to determine whether or not those jobs are necessary. Okay, that's where it gets rough. Yeah, so an algorithm will decide whether or not you get to keep your job. Yeah, that's that's that's that's a little scary. Now. Some other
DOGE news here. Uh. The House Speaker Mike Johnson in an interview with a Glenn Beck's Blaze News yesterday, saying that Congress will continue to have close ties to DOGE despite some hesitancy within the Republican Conference, but Speaker Johnson saying that he will work to to codify DOGE cuts despite the hesitancy of some in the Republican caucuss. So he's standing by it. What Ron de Santis is now talking about, maybe Florida needs a Doge, their own Doge.
There have been again some here in South Carolina said maybe we need to do that too. Well. It's uh, it's been interesting, hasn't it. You know, the the initial premise that if you're working and being paid by the American taxpayer and not doing your job, well two things. Number number one, yeah, you should be terminated. And number two, is that job even necessary.
If we haven't noticed you haven't been doing your job, then maybe it's not well exactly. I mean, if it hasn't been a drain on the on the government, you not doing what you were supposed to be doing, then maybe we don't need you to be doing it.
Sure, we don't need anybody to be doing it. Okay, Well, so there's a second email out there. You got a second chance of your federal employee responded again. You know, if you're a federal employee, do you what do you do here? You're easy to tell you don't respond, Well,
it'll play. But I still stand by what I said yesterday and that at some point in time here, maybe in the very near future, this uh you know someone as a power play between Trump and Musk that you know, something's going to happen here and there's going to be a split. I just hope that the the eye idea, what doge is all about, doesn't go away. If that happens, it's important. And oh, by the way, the polls indicate that yeah, we the American people like this concept, and even Democrats.
The conversation begins here, this the society problem.
This look why people are nowadays? They don't think they've just add.
One O three point five FM, five sixty AM w VOC. This is Columbia's Morning News with Gary David and Christopher Thompson on one O three point five FM and five sixty AM w VOC.
The seven forty two. Good morning to you and we appreciate you being along. It's Tuesday, February twenty fifth. Okay. Now, one of the top priorities coming into this legislative session over the State House was tort reform. Again. Several years back, the State House passed a bill that had the well, had the consequence of of driving some small business this is out of business in this case, we're talking about,
you know, establishments that serve alcohol. And the end result was that you had well some insurance companies pulling out of the state, and then the ones that were left charging exorbitant rates to ensure some of these places and to the point where some of them just shut their doors, going out of business. So this was one of the priorities coming into this year was a tort reform when
it comes to lawsuits. But needless to say, that's gotten a lot of pushback and now the Republican Caucus here in our state spending a six figure amount about a quarter of a million dollars on Fox News to try to as the posting courier says, counter a shadowy public influence campaign this targeting these lawsuit reforms. They launched this ad campaign yesterday. I have yet to see one of
these spots. I'm sure it won't be long though. Needless to say, the public relations push they're trying to push back against as well from the legal community here in our state, and for obvious reasons, the proposal itself is very pop in the business community. As the ad says, the lawsuit industry in our state feeds greedy elites while small businesses starve. These lawsuits feed the beast, and that's why South Caronadina's legal elite or fighting reform. This was,
I mean, going into it, we kind of knew. Listen. The State House is made up mainly of lawyers. Not all of them are, you know, in personal injury or but a lot of them are.
You've got a lot of special interests at play here.
Oh yes, I mean.
One of the leaders of this movement, Senator Shane Massey, is not only a lawyer, but he represents insurance companies and that has been pointed out more than once on social media.
So yeah, I mean, we should have seen this coming, right.
So now that's part of the problem is parsing out. Okay, you know, is this bill good for you or is this bill good for us? And you're trying to figure that out with some of the big players here like MASSI for example, is it good for you in your business or is it good for South Carolina and our business? And I mean there's a lot of back and forth
finger pointing going on and this shadow campaign. I mean with at the very least the Republican caucuses, they're doing ads and they'll say who they are, and they'll say who's paying for the ads. A lot of the stuff that's going on on social media is a well organized to campaign, but with a lot of anonymous people sounding off, you know.
It might have been best for the Republican caucus to do the same the same thing. Quite honestly. I mean that that when it comes to these sorts of things these days, seems to seems to be more effective approach in many instances. So look for those ads. Just back and forth continues, and you know, we're a month and a half into the session.
Now, and something needs to be done. I think we can all agree with that. I mean, you don't want to see the number of you know, it's not just bars and restaurants who are leaving the business. It's those who might want to locate here or relocate here sure in South Carolina, who say, well, you know, I don't like the looks of that. That's not a business friendly environment for me. I'll just go to Georgia or North Carolina instead.
Right, And remember the the idea of this reformer lease part of it is to say, okay, there needs to be some common sense here when it comes to you know, who do you target because the way the law is written right now, what's happening is you may have a particular defendant in a case like this that really was not the most responsible for whatever what happened, but they got the deepest pockets. So that's who's being targeted in these lawsuits.
Or they may be the last win standing. Right, I'll settle with that bar, I'll settle with that restaurant, and here's the one who's least responsible. But they're still in the games for ever there worth.
Yeah, And so this this reform would would would look to change that. You need to determine the amount of negligence involved in a particular party as opposed to what's happening right now where it's just well, who's got the most money, that's who we're going after. Speaking of money, a meeting last night, customers of Tri County Electric co Op angry and frustrated. The co op held a community meeting and folks wanted answers. This was over the Gardner's
very adult activity center, and it got pretty heated. You have residents, some residents of Tri County reporting charges as high as a thousand dollars in a single month. That's just crazy. Others are saying even people who say they live alone are getting bills as high as seven hundred bucks for one month. There's some splaining to do there. I know we've had some cold mornings, but a thousand dollars electric bill, that's insanity. I'm not sure they got
the answers they wanted. Try count has already planned a price increase, effective in just a couple of days March one. They claim it's due to rising wholesale power costs which they're just passing along cold weather. You got to ye but I mean one thousand dollars a month.
That sounds ridiculous.
Yes it does.
And let's hope they're getting better answers than just well, you need to seal up your home, you need to be more energy efficient.
Turn thumbers did down. Yeah, that ain't gonna cut it.
You're listening to Columbia's Morning News on one oh three point five FM and five sixty AM WVOC. Once again, here's Gary David and Christopher Thompson.
Fifteen after eight. Good morning, and good to have you here for Tuesday, February twenty fifth. T if we may have an answer here to this what suddenly becomes the pressing question of the morning about the Gabecock baseball team being undefeated. Thanks to James for emailing says, it's the South is the only one of only two D one schools that has both baseball and softball team undefeated. Ah wow, that would clear that up.
That makes sense.
That does Okay?
All right, thank you James, Because as we mentioned the Gamecock softball team, they are but fifteen to zero, right yeah, and in the top twenty five and all four polls heading up to Charlotte tonight.
Yeah, so okay, that that would make sense. Then okay, all right.
Hey, thanks for figuring that out for us.
Yes, James, thank you, and this would make sense too. But the question is why has it not happened before? Stay newspaper. Well this headline this morning finally taking advantage city envisions park apartments dining on Columbia Riverfront. Well, twoth of the matter is, we've envisioned that for decades. They did a master plan back in the nineteen nineties. Whatever happened to that one?
And this really isn't a fair story in a sense. I mean you, I mean, you can give the city all the grief you want for not doing this sooner, but there really have There have only been limited opportunities due to the amount of land and then the access to that land. So now they're finally they finally got the last piece of the puzzle in place, which is the last bit of access they need, along with the donations from the guin Yard family and everything else. So yeah,
now it can finally happen. But now you've got to piece it all together and put the money together for it.
Well, you know, you get well, I guess the city's investment into the Bull Street project. I don't know what that is now. They had to build parking garages and such. But I mean Bull Street is not not maybe in the way it was initially envisioned. But Bull Street has finally taken off, and it took it took a while, but you know they're getting there with it. So but then you got you know, more money being pumped into to finlay Park, which you know, that one's a quandary
for me. You know, in its heyday, it was a really nice place, but through you know a number of things, it became a place nobody wanted to get anywhere near. And my concern is that you know, building they will come again. You know I'm talking about you know, if you can't keep a homeless population away, then you know, families aren't going to want to go there. It's become a you know, it became a you know, a blight on the city's landscape. How do you keep that from
happening again? And do you actually need it when you've got something maybe exactly the same thing, but I mean similar green space is being developed at at Bull Street and now you're talking about, well, the riverfront development is a bit different. We're talking about you know, they're open for world class restaurants and you know, apartments and such. Listen to the river from both sides beautiful.
I mean, this this would be a game changer. It would be and I don't want to cut the city too much slack. I mean, the fact that they didn't try and push this through sooner just it is baffling. I realize again all the pieces weren't in place, but you know, how do you not how do you not try harder to make this happen over the years, knowing
and you know, they've had some stops and starts. I mean there's still that there's that area behind the State Museum that's kind of partially developed, and now you look at what's happening at the apartments with you know, Beer Keller on the other side of the river, and it just it's amazing. They haven't been able to connect the dots.
You could you could make an argument that the West Columbia has done a much better job at developing along the riverfront than Columbia has. And again that's oh and you'd be absolutely right. And some of that is again who owned the land and what you had to get this and that. So but it's just you know, you're not going to go to another city the size of Columbia that has a river running through it like that. That hasn't in most of these spots, it's always been developed.
Why it wasn't developed originally, Well they put this city together is it is a bit of a mystery. I guess again whoever snapped up the land and didn't want to give it up? But whatever, So maybe listen, this doesn't happen you know, next month, next year, or next ten years. It's a long term project, of course, but at least they're talking about it again. Then they're you know, they're they're again looking for developers right now to come
up with a design. Well again, I would would argue that we had a design back in the nineties, you know, thirty some odd years ago. There was another Interves master plan was published back eighteen years ago in two thousand and seven.
Well that was that was the master plan. Again, that was just a general they're talking about laying out exactly how the riverfront's going to look, and they're talking about, you know, incorporating some of the features that are still there. I mean, we've still got I mean, we don't have the ornament anymore. We finally unburied all the bullets.
Let's hope.
But I mean there's still kilns and all kinds of things that were used when this city was just beginning, and they're gonna try and incorporate all that.
Well it be, it'd be really nice to have that developed. Just beginning to wonder what it happened in my lifetime or not, because I ain't get no younger.
How old are you again?
Let's see, I've forgotten. I'll be sixty six in June. No, No, that's a no. Yeah. Will they finish malfunction junction before I passed?
That that may happen.
I'm on the borderline for that one.
I'll bring pictures when I visit you.
Thank you, You're welcome. I'll be so far gone, but I have no who you are.
As i'm feeding you your jello, I'll say, Gary.
Look, this was your dream. Here it is the riverfront. Just take me down there and sit me out by the river anyhow, Okay, Uh, well, I'll put it on my bucket list. Huh. Maybe a world class dining experience along the river in Columbia before my time is up.
Let's hope.
Let's hope. Why am I not feeling real confident about that though?
I and again I feel like this is a little bit of a hip piece. I feel like the new local newspaper writes this like once every five years. But on the other hand, we do all we should all feel a little impatient at this point because it should have happened by now.
Yeah, it should have been built that way to begin with. I'll still all still maintain that argument right there, just me speaking. All right, so we'll revisit this in five years, but we're still here.
I'm just saying, if you're a squatter, you have more rights than homeowners.
Shot atity, just same one on three point five FAMN, five sixty am w VOC. This is Columbs. He is Morning News with Gary David and Christopher Thompson on one O three point five FM and five sixty am WVOC.
Final thoughts here for a Tuesday morning. Let's start at home here. We're Chief Justice of our state Supreme Court, John Kiddridge is asking for us some money from a state house and everybody, well, one of the problems is, uh, he says, our our family court system, more and more cases none I've judged to keep up and of course the big loser and all this is the kids that are getting caught up in the middle of separations and
divorces and custy disputes and adoptions and everything else. So the Chief Justice is asking UH lawmakers for close to two million dollars annually starting next year. Wanted to create a couple of more judge court family court judge positions, Electioniton County being one of the places that he says needs needs more judges and more courts. But it's it's not just that. He's also asking for some forty five
million dollars to modernize the online case management system. He says he oftentimes has to ask other agencies for information about what's happening in the court system. That's crazy.
I feel like this is just like the story you just did in the last half hour about the city of Columbia. Yeah, and finally getting to the riverfront. I feel like we've done this story before too. Yes we have where the court says, oh, there's a huge backlog, we don't have records keeping, we need to update our computers. I feel like we've heard all this before too.
Yes we have, and we'll revisit in five years. And see where it is.
So does the state just keep putting a band aid on it? Is that why it hasn't been done?
I don't know. This is we're in some cases working with antiquated technology. Man, Hopefully we're not using floppy disks anymore. Hopefully we at least graduated to the hard disks. I mean, but he says that the total price to replace the entire online system is somewhere in the one hundred million dollar range. We've talked about this before, the state has talked about this before, and we still don't seem to have done anything about this. Okay, upon Capitol Hill. In
the meantime, will the big beautiful bill get done? Now it's in peril, I would say, the Budget Reconciliation bill. Remember Trump liked the House version, the Senate passed a different version. Now the House is going to have to either agree to it or put up their own version. Get the Senate to a g to it, and well, this is like a big old mess as usual. Fox News reporting it was in peril last night. At least
two Republican lawmakers are threatening to vote against it. But Mike, remember yes, Republicans control the House, but not by much. And part of the issue there is that there were Republicans in the House who were tapped for cabinet positions by Trump, and well they haven't been replaced yet, so you can't afford to lose too many. And there are at least two Republicans who say they won't go along
with the speaker's plans here. Again, even if they do, that's a different version of what the Senate has done already. So Johnson continues to be optimistic. Of course, we all speakers are publicly at least he's rather tea leaves. He's kind of the votes. He thinks he can get it done. Well, we'll see. This is again one of these. Part of what's in this, don't forget this. Part of what's in this is the extension of the Trump era first term
tax cuts. Those will sunset at the end of the year if they're not put back into effect, and that so this is this is a part of that that has an impact on all well all of it has an impact on all of us, but that a direct impact on us. So heads up on that one. Your president is right. French President Emanuel mccron saying that about Donald Trump when it comes to NATO and spending. Well,
of course he is. And when he was in office the first time he got, you know, native countries to the pony up and meet a threshold and then well, you know, here comes Joe Biden, and oh, Joe won't care. So Trump has to come in and do it all over again. And Macron says, yeah, he's right, we need to ramp up our spending. And in his visit to the White House, I guess a lot was made about the handshake, right, the tug of war handshake between the two.
Oh, I didn't see that.
Yeah, the media decides to focus on interesting things. But Macron heapings some praise on Trump for taking the steps that well Joe Biden and apparently the rest of the world hasn't done yet never did do to try to end this Russia Ukraine conflict, but warning that Trump needs to be careful in the negotiation process. Now Trump is saying he feels like we'll have a deal done within the next couple of weeks. Well, we'll see. I wouldn't bed money on that, but it would be nice if
it were to happen. And apparently part of all these discussions that the administration is having with the Ukraine, and some of it revolves around mineral rights.
Well, that would be a good way to pay us back for all the money we've spent. Right, However, this whole idea of just conveniently forgetting the fact that Russia invaded and took over all this land. Yeah, and the United States sits on the side. The United States pairs up with Russia and North Korea at the UN.
Yeah, that's what what's wrong with that picture. There's a lot wrong with that picture. You know. The thing about Trump is he's he's he's he's he's a pragmant to us, he's pragmatic. Now he's a realist. I don't know how continuing this conflict benefits either side, most certainly the Ukrainians. Its things that a stalemate. Man, it's three years now, three years.
That doesn't mean you ever want to be on this side of Russia and North Korea.
Well, no, no, no, I'm not disagreeing with that.
In any international body.
That was odd. That was troubling. What about the approvals though for Trump? Well, Harvard Capps Hairri Survey a fifty two percent approval rating in his first month back in office. That feels pretty good. That does feel pretty good. It's thirty three percent strongly approve, nineteen percent somewhat approve. So he's he's above water on this one.
That should that should encourage the Doze effort to continue, because really that's been you know, for all to talk about the border in the economy before the election. Doze has dominated headline. Yeah, it's been all about since January. So that should encourage Trump and Musk to continue the effort.
This poll looked at eleven Trump policies and found that all but one earned a majority of voter support, all but one, and that one that only got thirty nine percent support was the Trump moved to rename the Golf of Mexico the Gulf of America.
That's certainly not a high priority.
You know, it ain't making my life any better or yours. I mean that. Okay, that was odd, I get it. And how many times did you see a picture of Trump behind the the resolute in the Oval office with the big picture of the Golf of America behind him that that well, okay.
He's waded into a couple of things he didn't need to wait into. I didn't mention this the other day. But you know, he's gotten involved in this whole dispute between the PGA and and the live tour in Saudi Arabia. Oh hasn't got Yeah, he's meeting at the White House with tiger Woods and golfers and it's like, all right, that doesn't need to be on his list right now either.
Well, you know, the golf fanatic the Trump is. I guess it's hard to stay away from that sort of thing. I get it. That's not helping you or me either. I get it. The top POLA see that has the most support. I don't think this is any surprise to anybody illegal immigration. So when you get eighty one percent of people who support that support the Trump administration's efforts,
eighty one percent, those aren't all Republicans. Those aren't all Republicans independence, They're some Democrats in there too, That's that's what's And you know again those just getting a lot
of support too. So so for all in all, I mean, at least as far as the American public is concerned, and for a lot of this is that that you know, Trump said he was going to do this and that and this and that, and he's come in and he's done this and that and this and that, and that's a breath of fresh air these days when it comes to politicians.
Right, okay, media buzz. Lester Holt is out at NBC. A little surprised by that. He's been there ten years. Ten years, remember now, he was he was the contingency planned. Remember Brian Williams was the heir apparent. I mean, he was going to be the guy Williams. He was going to be the guy that took over for Tom broke On and just went as long as Brokaw did. And yeah, Williams had a little trouble on the way to the truth.
Yes see, so quite a bit.
Lester Holt was kind of the Okay, well then let's go to let's pivot to him. And he was quiet, and he was unassuming, and he did his thing, and you know.
It was twice named America's most trusted news anchor.
I don't know that anybody really noticed that he was there. I don't know that anybody's going to notice that he's gone.
Probably not be interesting to see who takes his place. I guess CBS is trying the experiment going back to the like the Huntley Brinkley kind of thing, right with two anchors.
And then a lot of local stuff.
Yeah, yeah, so we'll see. Now, Hold, he wasn't fired. I mean you wanted these days all the NBC in NBC properties, you know, with what's all going on there. But he's stepping down himself and he's going to continue to anchor the dateline show.
Do you have time for me to squeeze something in real quick? Absolutely, because this just happened again the second time. I've gotten this easy pass if you've seen yeah, I've gotten you've seen the scam by now what. We don't have toll roads around here, so it's unless you go up to Greenble, unless you up to Greenville, so you shouldn't be fooled by this. But nonetheless, I saw that the Lexington Sheriff's Department is warning about this. It's everywhere
right now. But yeah, yeah, yeah, you're going to be told to click on a link and that link is going to lead you to malware in your phone.
Don't And it is so much more tempting when it comes to is a text message as opposed to an email? Yeah you think, wait, okay, they got my phone between that. Unlet's see Chase Bank and United Healthcare. I keep getting all those two day after day after day. I don't have either one of those, so but yeah, yeah, be very wary of anything to dodn't look right. Just delete it and reported, as John I always do. I'm not sure that does anything.
Nobody who says you owe them money is going to say I wish you a safe, smooth and happy trip. They'll pay up with sucker with an emoji, with an emoji, yeah yeah, look out for the easy pass gam